1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a printer that performs recording on a sheet material, in particular, a mechanism for temporarily stocking a sheet material that has undergone recording. The sheet materials to which the present invention is applicable include, apart from an ordinary sheet material such as a paper sheet which allows recording on one side or both sides thereof, a sheet material having a thermal activation adhesive surface which develops an adhesion property by being heated on the back side of the recording surface (printing surface), and a sheet material having on the back side of the recording surface an adhesive surface with a release sheet (liner) attached thereto.
2. Description of the Related Art
Conventionally, as disclosed in JP 2003-316265 A, there has been available an apparatus which, after recording on a sheet material serving as a recording material, temporarily stocks the sheet material for the purpose of cutting the sheet material in a predetermined length.
The apparatus disclosed in JP 2003-316265 A is a printer applicable to a sheet material having a recording surface on which recording, such as printing, is effected, and a thermal activation surface which develops an adhesion property by being heated on the back side of the recording surface.
This printer is equipped with a printing apparatus, a cutter device, and a thermal activation apparatus. The printing apparatus has a printing means for performing printing on a recording surface of a sheet material, and a first conveying means for conveying the sheet material in a predetermined direction. The cutter device is provided on the output side of the printing apparatus, and the thermal activation apparatus is provided on the output side of the cutter device. The thermal activation apparatus has a heating means for heating the side of the sheet material reverse to the recording surface, and a second conveying means for conveying the sheet material in a predetermined direction. Between the cutter device and the thermal activation apparatus, there is provided a space portion capable of deflecting the sheet by a predetermined length.
In this printer, constructed as described above, printing is performed on the recording surface of the sheet material while conveying the sheet material by the first conveying means, and then the thermal activation adhesive surface on the side of the sheet material reverse to the recording surface is heated while conveying the sheet material by the second conveying means.
In this process, the conveying speed of the second conveying means is set higher than the conveying speed of the first conveying means, whereby the sheet material is deflected in the space portion between the cutter device and the thermal activation apparatus. When the sheet material has been deflected by a predetermined length, the operation of the printing means and the first conveying means is stopped while continuing the operation of the heating means and the second conveying means, and the sheet material is cut by the cutter device.
While in the apparatus disclosed in JP 2003-316265A the sheet material is temporarily stocked by deflecting it into a U-shape, there is another known method according to which the sheet material is stocked by deflecting it into a bellows-like fashion.
As another conventional apparatus equipped with a mechanism for temporarily stocking a recording sheet, there exists a printer as disclosed in JP 2001-261228A. In the printer as disclosed in the above-mentioned publication, when the leading end of the sheet material undergoing printing sticks out of the discharge port of the apparatus casing, the sheet material is pulled or pressurized to cause recording drift, jamming, etc. before the completion of the recording or sheet cutting operation. To prevent such an inconvenience, the sheet material is stocked inside the apparatus until the recording and sheet cutting operations have been completed, the sheet material being discharged to the exterior of the apparatus through a discharge port after the completion of these operations.
This apparatus is equipped with a space in which the sheet that has undergone recording is kept dangling by its own weight while held by a driving roller and a driven roller. The sheet that has undergone recording is temporarily stocked in this space, and when the recording and sheet cutting have been completed, the driving roller is driven in a reverse rotation to switch the sheet conveying direction, and the sheet that has undergone recording and cutting is discharged to the exterior of the apparatus through the discharge port.
The mechanism for temporarily stocking the recording material as disclosed in JP 2003-316265A and JP 2001-261228A adopts a system in which the sheet material that has undergone recording is deflected into a U-shape or in a bellows-like fashion or kept dangling in a predetermined space until a predetermined processing, such as recording or sheet cutting, has been completed.
Thus, the mechanism has a problem in that the larger the length of one sheet required during the process from recording the sheet material to the cutting thereof, the larger the space that must be prepared for the stocking of the sheet material. In other words, depending on the size of the sheet material stocking space, the length of one sheet allowing recording is restricted.
Further, when the size of the space for stocking the sheet material is increased, the size of the apparatus main body becomes rather large. Thus, the temporary stocking mechanism as disclosed in JP 2003-316265 A and JP 2001-261228 A cannot be applied to a small-size mobile printer that can be easily carried about with one hand.